Winds of Folly (37 page)

‘The Austrians are in Verona,' he said.

‘Is that bad?'

Junot gave him a look. ‘It's bad for you,' he said. ‘You'll have to get up off your arse and ride.'

‘A horse?'

‘No, a fucking camel. Of course a horse! You can ride, can't you?'

‘I'm in the merchant marine, not the cavalry.'

‘Oh God.' Junot put his hands on his hips and stared at the sky.

Nathan took pity on him. ‘I suppose I could manage at a pinch,' he said, ‘but why do we have to?'

‘Because the Austrians are between us and Bonaparte. We'll have to take the back roads.'

But it was not so easy to find him a mount. They had to take one of the coach horses. Nathan eyed it doubtfully as they saddled it up. ‘How far do we have to go?' he asked.

Junot showed him on the map. The Austrians had followed the Adige Valley down from Trento, and the French Army was
on the far side, to the south of Lake Garda, about twenty kilometres to the west. But there were only two bridges across the Adige, apparently: one at Verona and one at Bussolengo, twenty kilometres further to the north. They were hoping the Austrians had not left a garrison there.

‘And you want to ride there now?' Nathan was dubious.

‘Well, I'm not hanging around here picking grapes.'

So they rode to Bussolengo. Despite what he had said to Junot, Nathan was perfectly at home in the saddle, but the horse they had found him didn't like being saddled and it didn't like being ridden. Nor was it at ease with the route they were forced to take, twisting and climbing through the vineyards until they came to a ridge overlooking the Valley of the Adige. Below them, sparkling in the evening sun, was the river. And spanning it, a small town with an ancient keep and a bridge. Bussolengo. It was clear, even from a mile away, that the Austrians were there.

‘Can we not try further upstream,' Nathan enquired, ‘and swim across?'

But the Adige, it appeared, was too deep and too fast – and Junot could not swim.

‘We will wait for dark,' said he, ‘and make a dash for the bridge.'

Nathan did not like the sound of that. Nor did the cavalry officer. The mounts were blown, he said, and the men exhausted. They had ridden over fifty miles since they had picked Nathan up from the lagoon. The horses would never descend the slope in the dark, he said, much less raise a gallop to cross the bridge.

‘Very well,' Junot conceded reluctantly. ‘We will rest up until dawn.'

So they rode back two or three miles to a small village set among the vineyards and billeted themselves on the unfortunate
inhabitants for the night. Junot took the best house for himself but was gracious enough to share it with Nathan. A woman cooked them a stew of beans and onions with some straggly bits of meat that could have been anything, but they mopped it up with hunks of bread and washed it down with the golden-white wine of the region.

‘This is the life,' said Junot, who was a peasant at heart.

But Nathan had one pressing concern.

‘What happens at dawn?' he wanted to know.

At dawn they crossed the Adige. They came down from the hills in the half-light with their bridles greased and muffled, the horses' hooves clad in leather. A low mist hung over the river and extended across the fields on either side. They could no longer see the bridge, or very much of the town except the top of the keep rising out of the mist – like the tower of an ogre's castle, Nathan thought, in a fairytale. He was not, otherwise, inclined to the whimsical. Junot had offered him a pistol but he had turned it down, not wanting to shoot upon Britain's allies, but telling Junot that as an American he was a non-combatant in this war, and that to kill anyone, Frenchman or Austrian, would be murder. Junot looked at him as if he was trying to be funny.

‘Well, I doubt you'll need it,' he said, when he realised this was not the case. ‘The last thing they will expect is an attack from east of the river.'

He might have been right, for their approach elicited no challenge until they reached the town, though Nathan was more inclined to thank the mist for that. But then, as they saw the outlines of the first houses, there was a shout, followed a moment later by the blast of a trumpet, and a line of white-clad troops seemed to rise up out of the ground almost at their feet.

‘Ride!' yelled Junot, drawing his sword and urging his mount forward.

Nathan seriously thought of letting them go, but his own horse, which could only be induced to walk by kicks and curses the day before, was perversely caught up in the excitement of the moment and broke into a wild gallop. The mist saved them. The mist and the sun, which splintered into a thousand spears in the vapid air, lancing directly into the defenders' eyes. They burst through the thin white line without losing a single man and charged on through the town. But when they reached the bridge there was a wagon drawn across the middle of the road and a double line of infantry drawn up in front of it.

The line erupted in smoke and flame. Men went down. Men and horses in a confused mêlée of lashing hooves and screams and blood. Nathan saw the lieutenant's face shattered, his body leaning sideways but his hands still clinging to the reins until he and his mount went over together. He saw a gap between the wagon and the side of the bridge and urged his mount towards it. There were figures rushing at him with bayonets but the charge swept them away. Four of them were carried through the gap together, jammed tight and jostling each other in their frenzy. One went right over the wall into the river. Nathan saw the horse's rolling eyes, the white foam on its muzzle. Junot was lashing about him with his sword, his face a demonic mask in the witch's brew of smoke and mist and fiery light. Then they were through and charging for the far end of the bridge. But there were men here, too, with their muskets levelled. Nathan lay low over his horse's neck, a roaring in his ears that he was surprised to find came from him. The thunderous report of the volley. More screams of beasts and men. Junot's horse went down and Nathan leaned forward and snatched him up, threw him over the pommel and rode on. It was instinctive, a part of the roaring in his ears, the
fury of the moment. If he had thought about it, he would not have done it. But by the time he did they were through. They did not stop until they reached the vineyards on the far side of the river and he put Junot down. There were four of them, five with Junot. They had been thirty when they started out.

Junot fell upon him, covering his face with kisses. ‘You save another life for France,' he declared. Nathan thought this was very French.

They rode on towards Lake Garda, the troopers taking turns to double up so Junot could have his own mount. There was no pursuit. They rode in a dazed silence. Nathan felt they were shocked by their losses, bewildered to be still alive. He knew he was. He felt he was to blame. He had brought Death with him, out of the lagoon of Venice.

They rode along the eastern shore of Lake Garda until they came to a small fishing village where they found a ferry: a broad-beamed sailing barge which took all five of them with their horses to Desenzano on the southern shore. There were more Frenchmen here – infantry, maybe a thousand or so. Nathan thought they looked beaten: an army in retreat. They had been part of the force besieging Mantua, Junot said. An officer told him Bonaparte had moved his headquarters to Lonato, a few kilometres to the south-west.

So they rode on to Lonato.

The bulk of the French Army of Italy was camped in and around an ancient fortress known as the Rocca which sprawled over the hillside above the town with a distant view of the lake. It was impossible to make an accurate estimate of how many troops were gathered here but Nathan tried – he thought it might be important. At least 10,000, he reckoned, but there could easily have been twice that. Mostly infantry but at least one regiment of
chasseurs à cheval
in their green uniforms and
a long train of artillery with gun limbers and wagons trailing back towards the lake. Nathan had a chance to look them over at his leisure for they rode right up to the castle and back down again in their search for Bonaparte. No one seemed to know where he was, or if they did they were not willing to disclose it, even when Junot lost his temper and threw his hat on the ground. But finally he met another Colonel who told him he had just been to see Bonaparte and that he was down in the town, in a villa called the House of the Podestà – the residence of the Venetian Governor.

‘What do I call him, if I speak to him?' Nathan asked as they rode into the town.

‘What do you mean, what do you call him?' Junot had recovered some of his old charm since the incident on the Adige. ‘What – do you think you call him
Nabolione
, like his mother, or his brothers and sisters? Even they don't dare call him that now. You call him “my General”, like the rest of us, with respect. He is not the man you knew in Paris. He's
Il Liberatore
. The Liberator of Italy.'

‘I treated him with respect in Paris,' Nathan objected.

‘I'm fucked if I noticed,' Junot grunted. ‘And he certainly didn't.'

‘Well, I do not suppose for a minute that he will have time to speak with me,' Nathan said. ‘Now he is so important.'

‘Oh, he will speak with you, don't you worry –
if
we ever find him,' said Junot.

But they did find him – where the Colonel said they would, at the House of the Podestà in Lonato. He was sitting in a chair in one of the upper rooms, surrounded by lesser mortals, with his eyes closed and his head lolling.
Il Liberatore
, the saviour of the Revolution, the new God of War. He had not changed much since Nathan knew him in Paris, except he had a better uniform. But he had the same lank, straggling
hair cut off in a ragged line at the collar, the same sallow complexion and sharp, almost haggard features, so sharp you felt they could strike sparks off iron. If anything he looked younger than he had in Paris – he was possibly the youngest man in the room, Nathan reckoned, apart from Junot, though there was hardly anyone who looked much above thirty. There was a map spread out on the table and the officers were arguing over it. Nathan gathered they had lost the cavalry; some said it was at Peschiera and others that it was still at Vicenza. He heard the name Kilmaine and some disparaging remarks about the Irish.

‘They're not at Vicenza,' said Junot. ‘I've just come from there. The last time I saw Kilmaine he was at Roverbella.'

‘Are the Irish fighting for you now?' Nathan asked Junot.

‘Only Kilmaine,' said Junot. ‘And he's one too many.'

One of the other officers shushed them. ‘Keep your voices down,' he told them with a glance at Bonaparte. ‘He's been in the saddle for three days.'

‘So have I,' said Junot. ‘No one's worried if I've had enough sleep.' But he dropped his voice. ‘Come here,' he said to Nathan, ‘and I'll show you what we're up against.'

Nathan stood next to him at the map. It showed the whole of the Veneto from Venice to west of Lake Garda, and from Mantua in the south to Trento in the north.

‘We are here with about eighteen thousand men.' Junot stabbed a finger on Lonato, south of the lake. He swept his hand to the south. ‘Wurmser is here, marching up from Mantua, with thirty thousand Austrians. Somewhere behind him …' he frowned ‘… or in front of him is Sérurier with ten thousand of our men from Mantua. Behind us is Kilmaine, with the cavalry. Except that we do not know where they are. But when we find them, and when we get our men back from Mantua …'

There was a slow hand-clap behind him. Bonaparte had
woken up, or perhaps he had never been asleep.

‘Brilliant,' he said. ‘Junot is back. We can all go home.'

Junot grinned a little uncomfortably. ‘Good day, my General. How goes it?'

‘Not bad until you showed up.' Bonaparte peered at him through his sleepy eyes. ‘Where the devil have you been?'

‘I went to Venice as you ordered, my General. To fetch the American.' He presented Nathan with an awkward flourish, like a conjuror upon the stage after a trick that has gone badly. Several of the officers looked at Nathan curiously. Bonaparte frowned.

‘Captain Turner. Welcome back. We missed you in Paris. I wanted to invite you to my wedding.' He still had that thick Corsican accent. One of the reasons they used to laugh at him in Paris.
Nabolione
, they'd say, like an Italian mama beseechingly.
Buonaparte
.

‘I am desolate to have missed it, my General,' he said. ‘Please permit me to offer my belated congratulations. And how is Ro— Madame Bonaparte?'

‘Very well, I trust. I was obliged to leave her in Milan and now she has gone back to Paris. What were you doing in Venice?'

Nathan opened his mouth to reply – though not entirely sure what he was going to say – but Junot stepped forward and spoke quietly in the General's ear. Bonaparte closed his eyes again but nodded once or twice, then opened them and looked at Nathan sharply. Nathan wondered what Junot was telling him. He braced himself for the interrogation but Bonaparte raised a hand. ‘Well, it appears we have a great deal to talk about – when we have the leisure. But now, I am afraid, we have greater priorities.'

He levered himself out of the chair and crossed stiffly to the table. The other officers drew respectfully back.

‘So, now Junot has explained the position to you, with his usual exactitude, what are we to do about it?'

‘I have no idea, my General,' replied Nathan truthfully, with a smile that was not entirely convincing.

‘Well,' Bonaparte surveyed the map as if he were seeing it for the first time, ‘imagine we are in Paris. No, it is not easy, I agree, with all these mountains and the lake. But essentially it is the same. We are outnumbered and surrounded with our backs to the wall …' He frowned. ‘Can you be surrounded with your back to the wall? Perhaps not.' Nathan wondered if he was feeling the pressure. At Paris he had commanded a few hundred men and fifty or sixty guns. He had forty thousand in the Army of Italy, the Viceroy had said, though if Junot could be believed he had no more than half that number at Castiglioni.